I ended up grabbing this tea at some point last fall, knowing that I’d be wanting to have some holiday-themed teas around to review on my blog over the winter months. I first tasted and reviewed this for my blog the Tuesday after Christmas, and finally managed to sipdown the sampler bag from Adagio this last week. I have to give it to Adagio, their samplers are pretty full compared to many samplers I order! It took a while to finish this off, and that was with help sharing this with coworkers…
I am not much a fan of black teas that are too strong and have too much of an astringent bite to them, and since this tea has a Ceylon base — a tea where I often have that issue — I was prepared for that. Hah! As far as I’m concerned, this is the sweetest, mintiest tea I have ever tasted! It tastes like getting a high dosage of those little peppermint candy freebies left out at the counter at restaurants in liquid form… every sip leaves that brisk, cooling minty sensation on the tongue. If you like peppermint, this is the tea for you! It is super minty and super sweet! For me, it was just a bit… too overwhelming. It wasn’t… bad, but it just felt like the flavoring was absolutely dominating the cup. I enjoy someone telling me “Merry Christmas,” with a smile on their face, but if they get right in my face and scream it at the top of their lungs, then it is just too much, you know? Then it gets annoying. And that’s what I felt like this tea was doing.
Since I usually will make an “extra-strong” brew when I want to latte a tea, so the flavor notes will shine through after adding the milk, I figured this tea would be a good candidate, as it already had such a strong flavor. So I decided to froth up some hot chocolate almond milk, and try it in a minty cocoa form. Now that was quite nice! It gave it a sort of of chocolate-mint appeal, the milk cut down on some of the overwhelming mintiness just a bit, the flavor was enough a normal brew worked great for a latte, and it had a lovely creaminess. It made for a great hot cuppa on a wintery day. Sipping this down latte-style using chocolate almond milk became my go-to, and it was very nice!
Full Review: https://teatimetuesdayreviews.wordpress.com/2017/12/26/tea52/
Flavors: Mint, Peppermint, Smooth, Sugar, Sweet
